death 1
In 2000, then Kedah state assemblyman for Lunas, Dr Joe Fernandez while talking on his mobile phone was shot dead in Bukit Mertajam by unidentified men. Dr. Joe Fernandez, 54, who was shot three times by two men at the Jalan Maju Jalan Harapan junction in Bukit Mertajam on a motorcycle while driving home from his clinic in Kulim on Nov. 5, 2000. He was shot at his abdomen. He died at the Bukit Mertajam Specialist Centre at 3 pm.
According to the police, the politician, who was also Kedah Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) deputy chief, was caught in a traffic jam at a junction in Bukit Mertajam about 2.30 pm. Two men on a motorbike stopped beside his Nissan Terrano and one pulled out a gun. At that time, the doctor was on his mobile phone with an employee at his clinic nearby.
After the shooting, the gunman walked back to his waiting accomplice and drove off, leaving bystanders dazed. Dr Fernandez's employee rushed to the scene on hearing the gunshots over the phone.He drove the doctor to the specialist centre. But it was too late and Dr Fernandez died half an hour later.
"This is certainly not a robbery,'' said Penang deputy chief police officer Datuk Abu Kassim Md Noor. Police also ruled out the possibility of the involvement of hired killers as there had been no reports of death threats to Dr Fernandez. The police have yet to confirm the motive for the killing and described it as cold-blooded murder. Datuk Abu Kassim confirmed that the police had a description of the suspects and were investigating.
The politician leaves behind his wife, Dr Louis Mary Rose, and a daughter.After joining the MIC in 1975, he was elected as Kedah MIC Youth chief four years later and retained the position until 1990. He won the Lunas state assembly seat in 1995 and defended it successfully against three challengers in 1999 general election with 9760 votes against M Kathiravelo (DAP) 5060 and Ibrahim H Md Rashdi (Bebas) 2168.
Coincidentally, the late Dr Joe was replaced by none other than Saifuddin Nasution of Keadilan. To most observers, strong linkage between Keadilan and Indian community has never been so strong. We shall not probe deeper for fear of being prejudiced.
In the Lunas by election, Saifuddin Nasution Ismail of the Keadilan party took the Lunas seat by a wafer-thin majority of 530 votes beating an MIC candidate. However There were accusations of racism when the Keadilan party refused to field an ethnic Indian candidate and selected a Malay.
death 2
S. KrishnasamyTenggaroh Assemblyman was assassinated on January 12, 2008 when a gunman shot him dead at 2.30pm just as Krishnasamy arrived at the party headquarters in Johor for a committee meeting. It is believed that the shot hit below his left eyebrow. The bullet went through to the back of his head. He had received death threats weeks before he was murdered.
Krishnasamy, 61, who was also the Johor MIC deputy chairman, was shot dead in the lift of the Johor MIC headquarters. He was found slumped in a pool of blood in the lift at about 2.10pm by Johor MIC Puteri chief R. Vithiya Mohan.
MIC president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu said Krishnasamy had told him about the threats before he left for India two weeks earlier.
“I just advised him to take care. That was the most I could say,” he said, adding that such threats were not unusual in politics. However, he could not confirm if the threats were linked to politics or business.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has expressed shock over the murder of Tenggaroh State Assemblyman Datuk S. Krishnasamy in Johor Baharu, and described it as a cruel and despicable act.Eight months later, September 2008, A 38-year-old businessman was detained in connection with the murder, Johor CID chief SAC II Amer Awal said . The 38-year-old businessman, who owns a restaurant business in the city, was picked up at about 9.15pm late Thursday. His arrest comes within days after the 36-year-old son of a senior MIC politician was picked up in connection with the murder. The arrest was made by a team from Bukit Aman.
It is learnt that investigations so far point to “politics” as the likely motive behind the killing. Dozens have been picked up in connection with the case, but all have since been released.
Murukasvary (MIC) later won the Tenggaroh seat in the general election PR12 after securing 11789 against PAS candidate Shahar Abdullah who just managed 3556 votes.
PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim said "I support HINDRAF's right to peaceful demonstration and therefore reiterate my appeal to the Royal Malaysian Police to approve a permit for their rally to take place on 25 November 2007." click here.
Anwar has described the Hindraf rally at the British High Commission as “a safety valve for long smoldering Indian Malaysian grievances.”
Anwar Ibrahim said he had been invited to attend some conferences on democracy in India and that he had only raised genuine grievances faced by minority groups in Malaysia during his current lectures.
"These conferences were planned five months ago, I gave my commitment and I attended," he told Bernama when asked what made him come to India at this time.
"The lectures were about the state of democracy and I gave my honest answers."
This is the famous Hindraf Memorandum to UK Prime Minister.
After the rally, a few were detained by police.HINDRAF
Hindu Rights Action Force
No. 135-3-A, Jalan Toman 7,
Kemayan Square,
70200 Seremban, Negeri Sembilan
Malaysia. Tel : 06-7672995/6
Fax: 06-7672997 Email waytha@hotmail.com15.11.2007
The Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
10 Downing Street, Fax: +442079250918
London, URGENT
SW1A 2AADear Sirs,
RE: 1. COMMONWEALTH ETHNIC INDIAN PEACE LOVING SUBJECTS IN MALAYSIA PERSECUTED BY GOVERNMENT BACKED ISLAMIC EXTREMIST VIOLENT ARMED TERRORIST WHO LAUNCHED A PRE DAWN VIOLENT ARMED ATTACK AND DESTROYED THE KG JAWA MARIAMAN HINDU TEMPLE AT 4.00 A.M THIS MORNING (15.11.2007).
2. APPEAL FOR U.K TO MOVE EMERGENCY U.N RESOLUTION CONDEMNING “ETHNIC CLEANSING” IN MALAYSIA.
3. APPEAL TO REFER MALAYSIA TO THE WORLD COURT AND INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT FOR CRIMES AGAINST IT’S OWN ETHNIC MINORITY INDIANS.
We refer to the above critical matters in Malaysia but which generally gets the least attention locally even by the Opposition parties, NGO’s, the Malaysian Human Rights Commission and the media for this community is generally regarded as politically insignificant, do not draw local or international funding and are deemed not pressworthy. To the contrary the Malaysian government has successfully projected itself to the world as a modern Islamic thinking country which is not true.
The ethnic minority Indians in Malaysia were brought in to Malaysia by the British some 200 over years ago. Since independence in 1957 the Malaysian Indians have been permanently colonialised by the Islamic fundamentalist and Malay chauvinists UMNO led Malaysian government.
Among the recent atrocities committed by this government are as follows:-
1.100 over Indians were slashed and killed by the UMNO controlled Malaysian government in the Kampung Medan mini genocide. Despite numerous appeals, the Malaysian Human Rights Commission has refused to hold a Public Inquiry. The UMNO controlled Malaysian courts struck off a victim’s public interest civil suit for a Public Inquiry to be held without even the said UMNO controlled government having to file in their defence. The UMNO controlled Attorney General and the Inspector General of Police refused to investigate and / or initiate an inquest into the death of at least six Indians in this tragedy despite.
2. Every week one person at average is killed in a shot to kill policy and in every 2 weeks one person is killed in police custody. About 60% of these victims are Indians though they form only 8% of the Malaysian population.
3. In every three weeks one Hindu temple is demolished in Malaysia.
The latest being the demolishment of the Mariaman temple in Padang Jawa, Shah Alam, Selangor early this morning (15.11.2007) and the next being the (Mutaiya) Hindu temple in Sungai Petani scheduled for the 29.11.2007.
A violent armed pre down attack at 4.00a.m this morning was launched by the UMNO controlled Malaysian government backed by about 600 police, riot police, Islamic extremist and armed terrorists which completely destroyed this temple.
In an attack two weeks ago, uniformed police, riot police and city Council officers hurled rocks and attacked unarmed Hindu devotees with knives, sticks and iron rods.
At least 20 Hindu devotees were seriously injured and 19 arrested including 4 of their United Kingdom trained lawyers in direct violation of Article 5 (Right to life) Article 8 (Equality) Article 11 (Freedom of Religion) Section 295 (defiling a place of worship), Section 296 (disturbing a religious assembly), 298A(causing racial disharmony) and Section 441(criminal trespass) of the Malaysian Penal Code.
These authorities are plagued by an above the law mindset and in fact liberally take the law into their own hands. These atrocities however does not happen to almost all Islamic places of worship. Please visit www.policewatchmalaysia.com for further and better particulars.
4. State sponsored direct discrimination against the Indians in Public University intakes, Indian (Tamil) Schools, skills training institutes, civil service and private sector job opportunities, business and license opportunities and in almost all other aspects of daily life.
Despite our hundreds of letters, appeals and pleas to the Malaysian King and Sultans, the Prime Minister, Attorney General, Inspector General of Police, Ministers, Chief Ministers and the latest being our letters to the Prime Minister dated 29.10.2007 and 30.10.2007 and to the Attorney General dated 1.11.2007 the Malaysian authorities are only proceeding with greater ferocity and with impunity with very little regard for the Federal Constitution and laws of Malaysia. So please help us.
CONCLUSION
We fear that this peace loving Indian community of Tamil origin having been pushed to the corner and the persecution getting worse by the day may be forced to into terrorism in a matter of time as what has happened to the Sri Lankan Tamils.
APPEAL
On our part we are committed to a peaceful and lawful struggle and pray and appeal that the Government of the United Kingdom:-
1. Moves an emergency United Nations resolution condemning these state sponsored atrocities and persecutions of Malaysian Indians in Malaysia.
2. Refers Malaysia to the World Court and the International Criminal Court for Crimes against it’s own ethnic minority Indians
Thank You,
Yours Faithfully
P.Uthayakumar
Legal Adviser
Bersih Rally
Coincidentally, another equally important rally took place on the streets in the capital city of Kuala Lumpur on the 10th of November 2007, two weeks before Hindraf Rally. It was seen by many as being far too obvious to be mistaken as coincidence. Some argued further that both rallies were preludes to the General Election of April 2008.
Event organizers of 2007 Rally intended to have a peaceful, non-violent rally, advising participants in the days and weeks beforehand how to keep the rally peaceful. However the rally was marred by government sanctioned police violence. The aim of this walk was to campaign for electoral reform. It was precipitated by allegations of corruption and discrepancies in the Malaysian election system that heavily favor the ruling political party, Barisan Nasional, which has been in power since Malaysia achieved its independence in 1957.
Anwar since 1970's had been involved in street rallies and Bersih rally was nothing new. It was commented by some that, in rallies, people tend to forget about the purpose of the rally, in the heat, enthusiasm and intimedation of the procession. Most will go home feeling angrier. In cunning political atrategy, this is what most politicians want.
Remarks
As a conclusion, now I miss the true meaning of being racist. I am not too sure now, the virtue of playing soft or hard on racial issues in politics. There are far too many people being guilty without being charged. Without doubt there bound to be one or two oppurtunist who emerged as champion while scrambling up the greasy pole of power. Greed and sickening ambitions drive some to racial crazy. As always, ordinary folks will fall as victims in racial disharmony.
beritadarigunung
